by Delia Ephron
First published 2013
Tracee flees her wedding and steals compulsively. Lana battles her drinking while turning heads with her looks. Rita married a minister but dreams of freedom from her suffocating life. On a sweltering summer evening, these three women escape together into the North Carolina night. Their getaway car dies on a deserted highway, forcing them to take refuge in what appears to be an empty nightclub. Inside they discover Marcel, who happens to be a lion. The unexpected encounter transforms all three women as they learn to dance salsa with their unlikely companion. Rita dismisses miracles as misunderstandings or outright deceptions, but Marcel challenges everything she believes about possibility and change. The women forge an unbreakable bond while discovering reserves of bravery they never knew existed.
Genres: fiction, literary-fiction, contemporary
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family, unlikely-companions
Setting: North Carolina
Period: 21st-century
304 pages · Paperback · Penguin Publishing Group
Content warnings: alcohol-abuse, mental-illness